Diversity and distribution of flower coloration is a puzzling topic that has been extensively studied, with multiple hypotheses being proposed to account for the functions coloration, such as pollinator attraction, protection against herbivory, prevention damage by ultraviolet light. Recent methodologies have allowed studies consider visual system animals other than humans, helping answer quest...

Noniridescent coloration by the spongy keratin in parrot feather barbs has fascinated scientists. Nonetheless, its ultimate origin remains as yet unanswered, and a quantitative structural and optical description is still lacking. Here we report on structural and optical characterizations and numerical simulations of the blue feather barbs of the scarlet macaw. We found that the sponge in the fe...

A new species of lizard of the genus Liolaemus from Neuquén Province, western Argentina, is described. The new species is a member of the Liolaemus rothi species complex, and mitochondrial and nuclear molecular data show it as sister taxon of the clade composed of (L. hermannunezi (L. tromen + L. loboi)), differing in size, squamation, coloration, and sexual dimorphism from the other species of...

We describe the frog species Diasporus citrinobapheussp. n. from the Cordillera Central of western Panama. The new species differs from all other species in its genus in coloration, disk cover and disk pad shape, skin texture, advertisement call, and size. It is most similar to Diasporus tigrillo, from which it differs in dorsal skin texture, relative tibia length, number of vomerine teeth, ven...

The Alpheus armillatus H. Milne Edwards, 1837 species complex contains several cryptic species of snapping shrimps including Alpheus angulosus McClure, 2002. A previous study of the phylogeography and coloration of the A. armillatus species complex found three distinct lineages of A. angulosus distributed throughout the Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, and Western Atlantic, with the Atlantic coastlin...

Résumé: La technologie sans fils aura un rôle de plus en plus important à jouer dans les télécommunications grâce à leurs propriétés, notamment, d’autonomie, d’intelligence et/ou de mobilité. Les réseaux sans fil joueront également un rôle de plus en plus important offrant un accès omniprésent au réseau, favorisant ainsi la mobilité de l’utilisateur. Plusieurs auteurs ont modélisé les réseaux a...

Whether hiding from predators, or avoiding battlefield casualties, camouflage is widely employed to prevent detection. Disruptive coloration is a seemingly well-known camouflage mechanism proposed to function by breaking up an object's salient features (for example their characteristic outline), rendering objects more difficult to recognize. However, while a wide range of animals are thought to...

The photochromic effect of thin amorphous W03 films, i.e., the coloration upon exposing the sample to ultra$iolet light, has been investigated by means of optically excited surface plasmons. Due to the high sensitivity of this technique, it was possible to investigate the dynamics of this effect on a scale as short as seconds. Our results demonstrate the dominant role of oxygen during the color...

Cryptic coloration is a classic example of evolution by natural selection. However, it has been studied almost exclusively in predator-prey systems, despite the fact that it may evolve in other groups, such as ectoparasites. The principle defense of hosts against ectoparasites is grooming behavior, which has a visual component. Host-imposed selection should lead to the evolution of background m...